Page 9 of The Scars of War (Of Ruin and Fire #1)

Soot Stains on the Mirror of Memory

I barely sleep. When I do, it’s not rest, it’s war with memories—with my own goddamn mind.

By morning, my sheets are twisted. My sketchbook is open on the floor.

The pages are covered in symbols I don’t remember drawing.

They’re not all the same. Some are jagged, others curved like smoke.

One is shaped like a cracked crown. I don’t look too long.

I shove the whole book under my bed like it’s radioactive.

Get up. Shower. Pretend.

The water’s hot, but it doesn’t touch the chill in my bones. Steam curls around the mirror, but my reflection fogs slower than the rest. Like it’s lagging…watching me. I blink and it clears. There’s nothing there. The feeling? That sticks .

I'm moving on autopilot while I dry off with my towel, pull on clothes, and shove something tasteless into the microwave. Pretend I’m human. Pretend I’m normal. My thumb scrolls over my phone, the glow washing pale across my skin, until the screen stutters…then drops into black.

When it snaps back on, my stomach twists. The wallpaper’s changed again, and it’s the same symbol. That fucking symbol , seared into the light as if it’s trying to brand itself into my memories.

I throw the phone across the room. It hits the wall and falls behind the couch.

I don’t go after it. Instead, I go to the trash can, digging out the sketchbook along with every page I tossed.

Marching them straight to the balcony, barefoot and pissed, I dump the mess into the ashtray bucket, strike a match, and light it all on fire.

Smoke rises in thick spirals, black, sharp, and mine.

I watch until the last edge curls. Let it burn.

I’m still on the balcony when the knock comes.

Three short raps. Sharp. Measured. Like whoever’s behind the door knows exactly what they’re doing.

I don’t move at first. I’m wearing an oversized T-shirt that smells like bourbon and regret.

My hands are smudged with ash. There’s charcoal under my nails and a fire still cooling at my feet.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

My heart thuds. Slow. Loud. I step inside, grab the knife from the kitchen drawer, the one I keep by habit, not paranoia, and move to the door.

No peephole. No shadow under the frame. Nothing.

I unhook the deadbolt and open it. No one is there.

Something is. A small box, matte black, with no label or address visible.

Just placed dead center on my welcome mat like a calling card.

The hallway is empty. No footsteps. No voices. Just that strange, quiet hum in the air, the kind that says you’re being watched, even if you can’t prove it. I step back inside with the box and set it on the counter. I stare at it for a second too long.

I finally open it, and nestled within is a sealed glass vial, it’s small, ornate, and filled with what looks like smoke, twisting as if it’s alive. I watch as a slow swirl of ink-black vapor spirals in on itself like it’s whispering secrets. Beneath it, a note:

“The first wasn’t the last. ”

- E

That’s it. No threat. No explanation. Just that line, like a ghost tapping at the window.

I reach for the vial, and the second my skin touches the glass, it pulses.

Cold shoots up my fingers. Like my nerves skipped a beat, like something ancient just noticed I exist. I drop it.

It hits the tile with a clink and doesn’t break.

Of course it doesn’t. I stare at it for way too long before picking it up gently and set it back in the box. Seal it. Slide it into the drawer.

I don’t know who “E” is. I know that was not a gift. It was a message. And the worst part? Something in me wanted to open it. What could have gone wrong?

I call in sick. Dragana doesn’t even ask why, just says, “Yeah, figured.” My apartment is too quiet, and too still, as if it’s waiting for something.

I try music, but it's too loud. I try eating, but it tastes like ash. I sit on the couch with a blanket and a blank notebook I pulled from a drawer. It’s not the sketchbook, that’s ash.

This one is just paper. Clean. For now, anyway. This will work for a new sketchbook.

I remember the lines. The weight of the charcoal. The way the symbol wouldn’t stop haunting the margins. It’s gone. This one is clean.

Without thinking, I grab a pencil and my hand starts moving without me telling it to.

Lines curve. Spikes follow. Shapes crawl out of the paper like they were already there, just waiting to be given life.

Another symbol. This one is different. No fire this time, something sharper.

Thinner. Delicate. A pattern like spores,a disease.

I freeze. “What the fuck,” I whisper. The air shifts. Just slightly.

And then…a flash.

I’m not in my apartment anymore. I’m standing in a glass room, the ceiling flickering with sterile light.

I look down. I’m barefoot. The floor is sticky with blood.

It isn’t mine. It isn’t fresh. It’s soaked into the grout.

The walls hum as someone whispers something behind me in a language I don’t speak but…

I understand? I blink…eyes now open, suddenly back on my couch, with the notebook open.

A single word scribbled across the bottom of the page in handwriting I swear isn’t mine:

“Contagion ”

I slam it shut.

The lights flicker. One bulb pops, shattering glass onto the kitchen tile.

I jump. Heartbeat hammering. The mirror in the hallway cracks, it’s just a thin line, diagonal, like a warning.

I walk past it slowly, paying attention to the reflection, for just a moment.

I see myself again on the scorched battlefield in the sky, just like the vision before.

Armor cracked. Mouth open in a scream. Then it’s gone.

Just me again.

Hair mussed. Eyes hollow. Hands shaking. I sit on the floor, back against the door. I don’t cry. I just breathe. Deep. Ragged. And try to remember which version of me is real. These dreams and visions feel like memories I can’t recall, but I know they belong to me.

I don’t remember falling asleep. I wake up on the floor, blanket tangled around me like a net and the lights are still out.

It’s too quiet. Not a peaceful kind of quiet.

A quiet that doesn’t feel right. Pushing to my feet, every muscle is tight as I try to scan the room.

The box with the vial is still in the drawer.

The drawer? It’s open. I know I didn’t leave it open.

A cold flush slides down my spine. The vial is still inside.

Unbroken. The smoke has changed. It’s slower now.

It moves like it's…watching? I slam the drawer shut.

My reflection catches in the cracked hallway mirror.

Except it’s not a reflection. Not exactly.

The reflection in the glass moves half a second late, blinks differently, and tilts her head at an odd angle.

Suddenly, a hand is reaching from behind her, wrapping around her throat, taking her by surprise and squeezing until she’s unable to breathe.

I don’t see a face, but notice another hand sliding down her body, pausing over her breast for a moment before reaching the waistline of her pants.

There’s fire in her eyes that say she’s the one in control, even with a hand cutting off her oxygen.

I watch for a moment, turned on as the faceless hands bring her both pleasure and pain.

I close my eyes and can even hear the moans trying to escape her throat.

“What the fuck?” I say aloud as if someone can hear me, removing my now-wet fingers from below the waist of my pants.

Quickly, I turn around to make sure there is no one standing behind me.

Afraid, but not of the reflection. Afraid because I liked who she was and what was happening.

Both tempted and terrified at the same time by the strange reflection who wears my face. I don’t look again.

I head for the kitchen, just to move, to do something, anything, and the air shifts again. It isn’t like wind or temperature, it’s as if there is a presence. Something else is here. I freeze.

A whisper curls through the apartment. Clinical.

Detached. A voice that sounds like it was never meant to touch human ears.

“Elevated pulse. Cortisol spiked. Still responsive.” I spin around, heart hammering.

Nothing. I feel it. Eyes on me. Data is being logged.

Like I’m under glass. Another whisper. This one is closer.

“Subject unstable. Incubation is accelerating.”

The mirror spiderwebs with cracks. The kitchen bulb bursts overhead. I don’t scream. I won’t. I move towards the door but stop. Something is sitting on the floor, just under the edge of the couch. Just far enough for me to see it. An envelope. Again.

This one was sealed in wax the color of dried blood. I don’t remember it being there. Like all the other surprises before, I don’t remember bringing it but I know it’s meant for me. I kneel. Crack the seal.

Inside…one slip of paper. No greeting. No name. Just one word, scrawled in that same sharp, elegant handwriting:

“Incubation”

My blood runs cold. And just beneath the ink, as I tilt the paper, another mark appears.

A symbol I’ve never seen before. It looks like wheat, bent into the shape of a crown.

The paper crumbles in my hands, but the mark doesn’t vanish.

It burns into my mind like it’s always been there. Like it belongs to me.